AC GT Multiclass @ Okayama - Sunday 9th January 2021

thom462 · Jan 10, 2022

Thx all for racing today. Didn't practice until short to qualy as I already had another race today and had no special setup (still not good at adjusting setups by the way) so I am happy with the qualy pace although I didn't manage to do all sectors ok in one lap which could have been a 1.29.0 round about. Unfortunately most time of race I had no fights but I did no major mistake so at least that's ok. After start there was presssure from @Interslice and at least I could follow Enzo the first laps which was ok. But the gap increased to front and back and so I kept it constant. I was on a soft 50/50 strategy and to my surprise the soft tyres were pretty ok after 32 minutes but I changed them anyways cause gaps were too big.
Thanks @Interslice Brian for organizing and thx again for the good and fun racing in these troubled times. cu next time

HF2000 · Jan 10, 2022

Wow I was exhausted and completely soaked after this one. For the whole hour I was in battle with @Kek700 (You must have fully recovered from Covid, Ernie). Qualified 2nd and with a great start ( and a 'sh..start' from Tim) I took the lead for the GT4's. Until the pitstop the gap with Ernie was between 0.5 and 1.5. I decided to do an overcut and went in for the mandatory pitstop. It didn't work out well, I had some bad luck with overtaking GT3's and Ernie came out of the pits just in front of me. The battle went on with the same gap but in reverse order. In the last lap in the chicanes after the straight there was a chaotic situation with two GT4's about to being lapped by Ernie and me and Brian and Stefan who were lapping me and Ernie and Tim not far behind. So seven cars going into that tricky part of the track with me and Tim last. I chose the outside that worked well because then I got the inside of the two lefthandlers and I could even take the lead when Ernie got stuck. But Ernie got a bump from Brian (I think) and got a bump from Ernie because of that and I went a bit off track and I had to brake hard because Stefan suddenly came in front of me. Tim was able to take advantage, so I finished 3rd. A bit disappointing end to a great race.

Congrats to the podium. I like this combo. For me practice time with the Ginetta is less than with the other GT4's so I have more time for other things. So thanks for organizing, Brian!

Shed 17 · Jan 10, 2022

After struggling to get on the server ( there was something wrong with the Ginetta download even though I wasn’t using it) and some network issues in practice, I had little track time to get settled and started at the back of the GT3 pack.
The first few corners had me battling with Hape in the 650s but he went off at the Hairpin corner with a very late braking attempt, just missing Casper.
That put me on the tail of Casper in the 911 and on lap 3 he went wide at the Hairpin. I could get the Z4 to turn tight there and I went for the gap but the 911 had so much punch on the exit that we both found ourselves on the same piece of tarmac. As I tapped the right rear of his car I waited for him to catch up and regained the same positions we had before this incident. Glad I did because we had a great battle for 30 minutes until I had to pit for new softs. I guessed Casper was going for the splash of fuel only strategy so my task was to try and catch him as his tyres went off.
I was closing in but traffic and a couple of visits to the grass meant I finished in a safe 7th place but enjoyed the battle. That 911 has so much corner exit grunt compared with the Z4 but even so, well done Casper for hanging on to it for so long.

. I really like the feel of the 911 when I have tried it but haven’t had enough time to experiment with the tyre management thing.
Well done also to the podiums, apologies to any GT4 guys I may have squeezed into Redman corner and thanks to Brian for setting this up, great combo.

Kek700 · Jan 10, 2022

Could do little about Han other than stick like glue, my COVID is still hanging on but I do not cough myself of the racing circuit any more.

I took the long haul, had reasonable pace and could race for 60min , so I just had a splash and dash to do. Once Han went for a pit I just put in three 1-35 laps and took my chances with the pit stop. I also was waiting for Tim to catch, I would have given him an easy overtake , expecting Tim to fight with Han giving me an easier race, but Tim was having his own problems with the GT3 cars and trying to close 2 seconds is not easy.
But fate took a hand got I held up and lost my advantage, then there was 6 of us heading for a one car corner, so I had no option but to keep my foot planted and hope for the best, I was just a passenger for that corner. I think we all were.

I could have done with out the blue flags not holding me up for two laps, that was almost certainly the cause of the last lap problems, but they were so engrossed racing each other I doubt if they knew much about the race behind.
The only victim was Han loosing a place, all in all a very exciting race with big bits of drama and long spells of tedium . Many thanks to @intrerslice for the organisation and to all eventual podiums: